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Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 03 January 2016

:: NATIONAL ::

A group of four terrorists stormed the Pathankot Air Force base early morning, killing six services personnel and injuring 18 after a fierce gun battle through the day, before being shot dead.
The attack raised the spectre of cross-border terror yet again challenging peace efforts between India and Pakistan.
One Garud commando of the Air Force and two Defence Security Corps personnel were among those dead.
The attack was the culmination of several dramatic hours that began on December 30-31 night, when the terrorists are suspected to have sneaked into India from Pakistan.
Sometime around early Friday morning they intercepted a Superintendent of Police, Salwinder Singh, and two other men near Dinanagar.
The terrorists thrashed them, dumped the SP on the road a few kilometres away and slashed another person.

All six north Indian cities for which data was available had worse air quality than Beijing in 2015.
However the south’s comparatively better air quality levels could hide some lethal truths about toxic combustion sources.
Launched in April 2015, India’s National Air Quality Index portal produces an Air Quality Index (AQI) value for around 15 cities based on the most prominent pollutant at that time for that city.
Pollution monitoring stations measure the concentration of six different pollutants PM2.5 (particulate matter of diameter less than 2.5 micrometres), PM10, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and ozone.
For the AQI to be calculated, a station needs to have values for three or more pollutants, one of which needs to be particulate matter.
The AQI is then classified along one of six categories — good, satisfactory, moderate, poor, very poor or severe.

In the attack on the Pathankot Air Force station, one of India’s key airbases on the Western border, the air assets stationed there was miraculously saved as security forces quickly sealed of the area.
The MiG-21 BiS fighter jets and the Mi-25 and Mi-35 attack helicopters were in the technical area which was swiftly sealed of. The attack is another in a string of hits on security installations.
However, it is still surprising that even with specialist puts a forces such as the National Security Guards (NSG) and the Garuds (Air Force Special Forces), along with others, it took close to 13 hours to neutralise all the terrorists.
The IAF said intelligence in had been available of likely attempt by terrorist to infiltrate into the military installation in the Pathankot area “Due to the effective preparation and coordinated efforts by all the security agencies”.

Saudi Arabia executed 47 people on Saturday, including a prominent Shia cleric behind anti-government protests and Sunnis convicted of involvement in deadly al-Qaeda attacks.
The 56-year-old cleric, Nimr al-Nimr, was a driving force of the protests that broke out in 2011 in the Sunni-ruled kingdom’s east, where the Shia minority complains of marginalisation.
But the list does not include Nimr’s nephew, Ali al-Nimr, whose arrest at the age of 17 and alleged torture during detention sparked condemnation from human rights groups and the U.S.
i executions are usually carried out by beheading with a sword. Executions have soared in the country since King Salman acceded the throne in January 2015, after the death of king Abdullah.
Last year, Saudi Arabia executed 153 people convicted of various crimes, including drug- trafficking, after 87 were put to death in 2014.

India may increase its solar energy capacity four-fold during the next fiscal year ending March 2017.
Today our solar capacity is about 4,500 MW and the capacity addition target for this year is about 2,000 MW.
During 2016-17, govt. Is hoping to add 12,000 MW in solar sector alone. Thus, including other renewable sources, there will be a total capacity addition of about 15,000 MW during next fiscal.
The government is focusing on speed, skill and scale rather than subsidies to drive reforms and progress in the energy sector.
The water heaters that ran on solar energy had subsidy components some years ago.
The government has electrified 20 per cent of the villages that were without power at the start of this financial year.
As of January two,2016 the DDUGJY had electrified 3,656 or 20 per cent of the 18,452 villages without power at the start of this financial year.
The scheme had an outlay of Rs 76,000 crore out of which the Centre committed to provide a grant of Rs.63,000 crore.
Of the remaining 14,796 villages that still had to get electricity, work had started in only 1,843 (12 per cent) of them.

Stephen Constantine’s young Indian team faces its biggest hurdle Afghanistan, the defending champion, in the final of the SAFF Suzuki Cup football championship at the Greenfield stadium.
The Indian team has blown hot and cold during the course of the tournament sometimes to the point of being mediocre. If the semifinal match against Maldives is taken as a template for India’s campaign so far, it had all the ingredients that pointed to general sloppiness.
India allowed Maldives to score two goals and coach Constantine had pointed to the lack of concentration of his players in the second half. Similar errors in defence against Afghan- istan will be a disaster.